Basketball is a common sport played by youths and adults the world over and especially in the United States. Most people learn the game from other friends without the help of a coach or a trainer. Consequently, bad habits and poor techniques are picked up. As with any activity or sport, the longer and more often a person uses bad technique, the harder it is to learn good habits.
Players need to learn proper technique and need to know when they are using proper technique and when they are not. Especially where shooting is concerned, players need to learn all the fine points of shooting since small mistakes can have the worst consequences. Therefore, players need a reminder of good technique before or during every shot until the proper technique becomes a habit. Repeated practice of the proper techniques is necessary.
When proper technique is used over and over, the correct group of muscles and nerves develop and work together to shoot the ball correctly creating consistency and reproducible results. With repeated practice, the muscles are exercised and are thus strengthened. The nerves, muscles, and mind all work together to make good technique a learned skill. This is referred to as ‘neuromuscular memory’.
Proper positioning of the hands, arms, shoulders and body before a shot are critical and are also part of good form and proper technique, as well.
In a preferred method for executing a one hand push shot, the opposite hand is used as a pre-release stabilizer or guide and the forearm of the shooting arm is kept parallel to the center line of the body during the shooting motion. The centerline of the body is an imaginary line dividing the player vertically down the middle of his or her body. When the forearm of the shooting is not aligned with the centerline when shooting, the basketball has the tendency to stray from its proper shooting trajectory. This tendency causes a decrease in the percentage of shots that fall through the hoop.